Recovering
by ItBeatsMe
Summary: They'd talk of art and literature and psychology, mostly on weekends.
1. Chapter 1

**Spoilers**: Up to Harbingers, to be safe.

A/N: **space77**, you're awesome! Thanks for the beta. :)

* * *

Feet crossed on the coffee table, Booth slouched into the couch and nursed a beer. He had been feeling pretty damn low lately and it alternately made him want to sink into himself and rage at everyone. Even her. So it was a good thing that, after his being released from the hospital, she'd decided to go on some dig. Though it could be argued that he wanted _so bad_ to rage and yell and _hurt_ her because she had decided Guatemala needed her more than he did. He didn't need her for the tests or doctor appointments or even his therapy sessions with Sweets. He just needed his friend.

Cam had become a frequent visitor and had tried, in her own way, to help him feel better. She knew better than anyone (_except maybe Bones, who _left) how much this - the memory problems, the headaches, the feeling of helplessness - was affecting him. She'd call after work most nights, asking if he needed food or a friend. He accepted the food most nights and was silently pleased when she'd stay and eat with him. He never asked, but she knew him well enough to know when he needed company. One night, he had a particularly bad headache and was horrible to her when she'd called about dinner. An hour later, after a handful of (_prescribed_) pills had him curling under covers and around a pillow, he woke up to her sleeping form - arms and spine bent uncomfortably in an office chair she had parked beside his bed.

Angela also tried to pick up some of the slack, and he could tell part of that was because she had also lost a best friend. Lost temporarily, but lost all the same. Angela would fill him in on what she was doing that day or week, but soon enough they'd simply _talk_, no pretenses of work updates needed. They'd talk of art and literature and _psychology_, mostly on weekends. Her psychology, his anger, Bones' disappearing act... None of it was off limits, and as the days and weeks passed, his anger subsided and understanding reigned. Even excitement sometimes, because while she wasn't his Bren (_and he knew she wasn't_), she was his Bones and she'd be back. And while she was away on one of the digs she loved so much, he got to mourn the loss of his (_imagined_) wife without her attempts to fit his emotions into logical boxes and with the comforting ears and shoulders of Angela's hopelessly romantic soul and Cam's own mix of rational romanticism.

Sometimes it'd be Angela and Cam showing up at his door with Parker, and the four of them would play games or watch TV. When they went out, to small diners late at night or art museums or anywhere not too loud, Parker never asked why his dad wasn't driving or why Cam or Angela or both were always around. It'd been explained once, the day Booth had been released from the hospital. With his shaved head and healing scar, he sat in the cafeteria with Parker and explained that his old man couldn't see him as often until he felt better. It had been as painful for Booth to say it as it was for Parker to hear, and when Cam came to pick them up she'd shaken her head at Parker's (_their_) sullen face and offered to help. Offered _all_ the squints help, he remembered with a smile.

He and Angela had become better friends over the past four weeks, but both of them still felt as if something (_someone) _was missing. He didn't claim any mind-reading abilities, but he noticed her small sighs and the sadness in her voice whenever she told him a crazy story from their past. These stories were often launched at random intervals, when a word or phrase or feeling sparked a memory. Sometimes, she'd rub his temples to ease a headache as her soothing voice travelled in easy sound waves around him.

His cell phone vibrated against his thigh, tearing him from his musings. Setting his beer between his legs, he opened his phone and cradled it to his ear. His smile brightened as he listened and after a quick response ("_See ya soon, Bub."_), he snapped his phone shut. Pulling his legs down and setting his beer on the coffee table, he got up and padded to the kitchen. Two more beers and a coke grabbed from the refrigerator and set on the kitchen table. Another Saturday with his son and two good friends and maybe even a trip to Hodgins' place for a barbecue later if he felt up to it.

He'd be again given a reprieve from the lows he felt when alone in his apartment. And again, he couldn't help but wonder if this would change his friendship with Bones. At that moment, though, he was okay with the reality that it probably would. She went off on another dig, but he had to keep living and loving and recovering. He was sad that he was doing all this without her, but at the same time happy that he'd gotten to know and become friends with people he'd always considered _her_ friends, Cam being the exception.

Now, they were his friends too. And hopefully soon, they'd all be colleagues and friends and _family_ again.


	2. Chapter 2

_Spoilers_: Spans 5x01, Harbingers. So yes, spoilers for that.  
_A/N_: Thanks to **space77** for the many betas and look-overs! I changed some things, so anything not right is most likely my own fault. :) This chapter has a slight bit more language and is probably a bit more T than the last chapter._  
Disclaimer_: BONES isn't mine.

* * *

Throwing his faded dark gray Flyers shirt on, he padded to the door to grab his keys and step into his worn tennis shoes. Today was the day: he was going to demand Sweets sign those damn papers. He was bored and he knew who he was.

He was Seeley Joseph Booth. And he was _back_, baby!

Just as importantly, he knew who she was: his partner, who cocooned herself in logic and fled to the safety of work when too many emotions threatened the walls he'd been chipping at for so many years. And was it really fair that he expected her to stay when that same person telling her to put her heart into overdrive wasn't capable of comforting her when those cracked walls were breached? Was it fair to force her to confront emotion the Bren in his dream welcomed and reciprocated?

Maybe. But then, that would've had a different but still lasting effect on their friendship. He wouldn't have had the energy to shield her from his confusion, wouldn't have had the strength to deny his love for the Bren in his mind and the Bones in his reality. And he did love both, but he had come to love Bren the way a person loves a really good dream. The Bones of his reality, however...

He loved her, he was sure of it. Well, mostly sure (_alright, pretty sure in a confused, roundabout way_). But he'd started, weeks ago, remembering the things he'd learned about her over the years. Started remembering her heart, her quiet anger when working on a case and how good she was with kids, with dancing phalanges and the donation that had allowed Andy and his new guardians a chance.

And who could forget Brainy Smurf and Jasper? Actually, he did. But Angela had taken them from the top drawer of her desk ("_If Bren didn't care, Sweetie, these would've been in her own twisted, organized version of a junk drawer._") and brought them to his apartment one weekend. She didn't - couldn't - tell him what they meant, but just seeing them sparked his memory. His creased brow became smooth and a small smile appeared, but he wouldn't tell Angela what these trinkets, essentially small kids toys, meant. She had given him a weak pout, but these were his memories, good memories.

* * *

He felt...whole. His gun was loaded and tucked in his front pocket (_not that way, Buddy_) and his badge was in his back pocket. He snuck into her office, making sure Cam and Hodgins and Angela didn't see him. He wanted to surprise her, but without knowing how long he'd have to wait, he decided to lay on her couch.

"GAH!"

Her "OH!" was simultaneous, both of them popping up first in confusion, then excitement. Their hug was warm and strong, a moment where he swore they were clinging to one another. He tried to stave off the visceral memory of his dream Bren, but only succeeded in pushing it aside. Compartmentalizing, which he was just as good at as Bones. He tried to cover his anxiety with talk of "coinky-dinks" and reinstatement, but he knew it showed. But with talk of his impending return to duty came her unexpected question:

_What took you so long to recover?_

What took him so long? He had major brain surgery! He'd been beat down, laid up, depressed, confused… For a split second her blunt statement hurt him, but then he remembered that she was the type to state facts without thinking of the possible emotional impact.

When Angela walked in, he wanted to hug her. She, along with Cam, had been a constant support system these past few weeks. But then she talked about bodies and he was all about getting back into work mode. Besides, just like Brainy Smurf and Jasper were between him and Bones, he wanted to keep Angela and Cam and their summer – good, bad, and ugly – to himself.

As Angela stated, with her usual dramatic flair, that her psychic had told her that a bunch of bodies were buried under the Haversham, he wanted to roll his eyes (instead, he blew raspberries – not entirely professional, but definitely more fun). He was bored, though, and it'd give him the chance to work with Bones again.

He needed that extra link to his reality.

But why did Bones blow raspberries at the idea that they were profoundly linked? No matter how she rationalized it, the Bren in his dream, as well as the nightclub and everything else (_he really did miss those clothes…_), came from _her_. She had imagined it, wrote it, and his unconscious mind experienced it all. The fact that she'd written an alternate universe version of their relationship should've been proof enough.

He liked to think it meant she'd felt it, too.

He was getting mixed signals, though, and he hadn't yet recovered his Bones-reading skills. So he decided to talk to Cam, knowing she'd be more realistic and less…loud than Angela. When they finally got to the heart of the matter, she confessed his love for Bones before he did. She also told him he was the same guy he had been before the surgery, but he wasn't convinced.

Not yet, anyway.

And she warned him that if he told Bones how he felt he had to be sure. There'd be no going back. And he knew that, not only for her but also for himself. _He'd_ never be able to live if he laid his heart on the line and was turned down. It would break his heart in ways her logic would say was impossible. He decided to tell her though, that early morning in the mass grave. He chickened out, unable to tell her a damn thing.

When Sweets showed him the PET scans of his brain - from before his surgery, during his coma, and another recent set – he was glad he hadn't said anything. Sweets' _analysis_ left him more confused than ever and he was starting to question whether he was in fact ready to come back to work. The emotional roller coaster ride he was on was wearing him out and, God forgive him, he missed some of the simplicity he'd found when love was only a concept, a feeling, and not a visceral force.

The whole damn case had him confused, too. His investigative skills were good, that wasn't the problem. It was Bones and Cam and Sweets and _Harmonia_. A damn psychic was interfering and injecting her thoughts (_the "cards"_) on his relationship with Bones. But when she was stabbed and bleeding and he was holding her, he _knew_ he loved her. Before the surgery, after the surgery… No doubt in his mind: he was in love. He told himself he'd tell her, that she deserved to know. And he was tired of everyone saying things to make him doubt himself. So he decided to tell her after knowing the case would go unsolved. Because though they couldn't prove Fargood killed those people, he knew he really was himself again.

But another doubt surfaced, this time in the form of a fucking clown. It was funny, in a very not-funny way, how one clown could change everything. His laughter and subsequent realization drove home the fact that his brain was still, as Sweets had explained many times, repairing certain pathways.

Well, at least now he had a new – much more _logical_ - reason to hate them.

Because if he couldn't remember the things he hated, who was he to tell _anyone_ he loved them? It wouldn't be fair to her, and he knew that she'd use his confusion against him.

She'd say that his declaration was due to his confusion, maybe even asking for and then using Sweets' analysis against him. He was sure that would devastate him in more ways than one. No matter how she'd explain it, she'd be disregarding his feelings in favor of science – if she wanted to do that with her own feelings then that was her prerogative, but he knew his feelings, no matter how convoluted they seemed, were genuine.

The problem he faced was how to convince her. He was beginning to think what he needed to do was show her, slowly and methodically and in every way he could think of. Intense looks needed to linger and veiled gestures needed to become obvious.

He wanted (_needed) _her to know that she already had his heart and soul, not awkwardly offer up some trite declaration that she could debate or argue or _logic_ her way out of.


End file.
